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Sunday, March 16, 2014

Today is Holi, the festival of colors! Here, in India, we celebrate this festival with lots of joy, verve and enthusiasm throughout the country. The festival has many purposes. First and foremost, it celebrates the beginning of the new season, spring. We color each other, almost losing our identities behind the shades of numerous colors, throw water balloons at others, even complete strangers at random, and above all have enormous fun!! ^_^ This festival is one of my favourites and goes without saying, I'm very very excited about today!

In this regard I'm doing this feature post - the connection of colors and books! Lots of books have name of colors in the titles. I'd be talking about some of those most famous books and also the color coding system of Penguin Publishers books.

Title: The Color Purple

Author: Alice Walker

Publishers: Pocket (2004)

Genre(s): Classics, Historical Fiction

Format: Paperback (304 pages)

Average Rating on Goodreads: 4.12/5

Celie is a poor black woman whose letters tell the story of 20 years of her life, beginning at age 14 when she is being abused and raped by her father and attempting to protect her sister from the same fate, and continuing over the course of her marriage to “Mister,” a brutal man who terrorizes her. Celie eventually learns that her abusive husband has been keeping her sister’s letters from her and the rage she feels, combined with an example of love and independence provided by her close friend Shug, pushes her finally toward an awakening of her creative and loving self.

Title: White Oleander

Author: Janet Fitch

Publishers: Little, Brown and Company (2001)

Genre(s): Contemporary, Women's Fiction

Format: Paperback (496 pages)

Average Rating on Goodreads: 3.87/5

When Astrid's mother, a beautiful, headstrong poet, murders a former lover and is imprisoned for life, Astrid becomes one of the thousands of foster children in Los Angeles. As she navigates this new reality, Astrid finds strength in her unshakable certainty of her own worth and her unfettered sense of the absurd.

Title: Black Like Me

Author: John Howard Griffin

Publishers: NAL Trade (2003)

Genre(s): Memoir, Non-Fiction

Format: Paperback (200 pages)

Average Rating on Goodreads: 4.08/5

In the Deep South of the 1950s, journalist John Howard Griffin decided to cross the color line. Using medication that darkened his skin to deep brown, he exchanged his privileged life as a Southern white man for the disenfranchised world of an unemployed black man. His audacious, still chillingly relevant eyewitness history is a work about race and humanity-that in this new millennium still has something important to say to every American.

Title: Green Eggs and Ham

Author: Dr. Seuss

Publishers: Random House (1960)

Genre(s): YA, Humor

Format: Hardcover (62 pages)

Average Rating on Goodreads: 4.30/5

Illustrated in color. Sam-I-Am mounts a determined campaign to convince another Seuss character to eat a plate of green eggs and ham. Green Eggs and Ham is a best-selling and critically acclaimed children's book by Dr. Seuss (a pen-name of Theodor Seuss Geisel), first published on August 12, 1960. As of 2001, according to Publishers Weekly, it was the fourth best-selling English-language children's book of all time.[1] The story has appeared in several animated videos starting with 1973's Dr. Seuss on the Loose: The Sneetches, The Zax; Green Eggs and Ham starring Paul Winchell as the voice of both Sam-I-am and the first-person narrating man.

Title: A Clockwork Orange

Author: Anthony Burgess

Publishers: W. W. Norton and Company (1995)

Genre(s): Sci-fi, Dystopia, Mystery

Format: Paperback (213 pages)

Average Rating on Goodreads: 3.94/5

A vicious fifteen-year-old "droog" is the central character of this 1963 classic, whose stark terror was captured in Stanley Kubrick's magnificent film of the same title.
In Anthony Burgess's nightmare vision of the future, where criminals take over after dark, the story is told by the central character, Alex, who talks in a brutal invented slang that brilliantly renders his and his friends' social pathology. A Clockwork Orange is a frightening fable about good and evil, and the meaning of human freedom. When the state undertakes to reform Alex—to "redeem" him—the novel asks, "At what cost?"
This edition includes the controversial last chapter not published in the first edition and Burgess's introduction "A Clockwork Orange Resucked".

Title: The Silver Chair (The Chronicles of Narnia #4)

Author: C. S. Lewis

Publishers: HarperCollins Publisher (2005)

Genre(s): Young Adult, Fantasy

Format: Paperback (268 pages)

Average Rating on Goodreads: 3.91/5

The story starts when Eustace Scrubb, introduced in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, is driven into the company of classmate Jill Pole at their miserable school Experiment House. The impetus is their need to find sanctuary from the gang of school bullies who run rampant in this laissez-faire and mismanaged school run by an incompetent headmistress. Eustace confides to Jill that he has recently been "out of this world" to a land called Narnia, and that his experiences there have led to the changes in his behaviour that everyone seems to have noticed. Jill initially believes that Eustace is lying, but when he promises and asks her to attempt to go to Narnia with him, she agrees. When the bullies are about to converge on the two, Eustace suggests asking for Aslan's help, and the two blunder through a gate that leads them to a high cliff in Aslan's Country.

Title: Blue Highways (The Travel Trilogy #1)

Author: William Least Heat-Moon

Publishers: Back Bay Books

Genre(s): Memoir

Format: Paperback (428 pages)

Average Rating on Goodreads: 3.98/5

Hailed as a masterpiece of American travel writing, Blue Highways is an unforgettable journey along our nation's backroads. William Least Heat-Moon set out with little more than the need to put home behind him and a sense of curiosity about "those little towns that get on the map-if they get on at all-only because some cartographer has a blank space to fill: Remote, Oregon; Simplicity, Virginia; New Freedom, Pennsylvania; New Hope, Tennessee; Why, Arizona; Whynot, Mississippi." His adventures, his discoveries, and his recollections of the extraordinary people he encountered along the way amount to a revelation of the true American experience.

Title: The Yellow Wall-Paper

Author: Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Publishers: The Feminist Press (1996)

Genre(s): Short Stories, Feminism

Format: Paperback (64 pages)

Average Rating on Goodreads: 4.11/5

First published in 1892, The Yellow Wall-Paper is written as the secret journal of a woman who, failing to relish the joys of marriage and motherhood, is sentenced to a country rest cure. Though she longs to write, her husband and doctor forbid it, prescribing instead complete passivity. In the involuntary confinement of her bedroom, the hero creates a reality of her own beyond the hypnotic pattern of the faded yellow wallpaper – a pattern that has come to symbolize her own imprisonment. Narrated with superb psychological and dramatic precision, The Yellow Wall-Paper stands out not only for the imaginative authenticity with which it depicts one woman’s descent into insanity, but also for the power of its testimony to the importance of freedom and self-empowerment for women.

Title: The Grey King (The Dark Rising #4)

Author: Susan Cooper

Publishers: Simon Pulse (2007)

Genre(s): YA Fantasy, Mythology

Format: Paperback (165 pages)

Average Rating on Goodreads: 4.18/5

"Fire on the Mountain Shall Find the Harp of Gold Played to Wake the Sleepers, Oldest of the Old...""
With the final battle between the Light and the Dark soon approaching, Will sets out on a quest to call for aid. Hidden within the Welsh hills is a magical harp that he must use to wake the Sleepers - six noble riders who have slept for centuries.
But an illness has robbed Will of nearly all his knowledge of the Old Ones, and he is left only with a broken riddle to guide him in his task. As Will travels blindly through the hills, his journey will bring him face-to-face with the most powerful Lord of the Dark - the Grey King. The King holds the harp and Sleepers within his lands, and there has yet to be a force strong enough to tear them from his grasp...

Title: My Name is Red

Author: Orhan Pamuk

Publishers: Vintage (2002)

Genre(s): Contemporary, Literary Fiction

Format: Paperback (417 pages)

Average Rating on Goodreads: 3.79/5

At once a fiendishly devious mystery, a beguiling love story, and a brilliant symposium on the power of art, My Name Is Red is a transporting tale set amid the splendor and religious intrigue of sixteenth-century Istanbul, from one of the most prominent contemporary Turkish writers.
The Sultan has commissioned a cadre of the most acclaimed artists in the land to create a great book celebrating the glories of his realm. Their task: to illuminate the work in the European style. But because figurative art can be deemed an affront to Islam, this commission is a dangerous proposition indeed. The ruling elite therefore mustn’t know the full scope or nature of the project, and panic erupts when one of the chosen miniaturists disappears. The only clue to the mystery–or crime? –lies in the half-finished illuminations themselves. Part fantasy and part philosophical puzzle, My Name is Red is a kaleidoscopic journey to the intersection of art, religion, love, sex and power.

The Penguin Books Color Codes

Arranging books according to color has become quite popular and looks great. However, it is a method that can result in placing paleontology next to poetry and novels next to non-fiction, a troubling thought indeed! That's why I adore the color-coding system that Penguin has been using 1935, wherein each genre is assigned a color and the spine (and sometimes the cover) of works within that genre are printed in the designated color.

Saturday, March 15, 2014

After reading the book A Newlywed's Adventures in Married Land, which was an ARC, I thought it'd be great to have a talk with the author Shweta GK about the book. Shweta agreed readily and here's what we talked about.

Hi! Welcome to my blog. Its such a pleasure to have you here! First of all, as we'd love to know, tell us something about yourself.

Hi Vinny, thank you for having me on your blog.
I am an author and a travel columnist.
My first novel 'Coming Up On The Show... The travails of a news trainee', was released in May 2011, by Srishti Books. It sold more than 10,000 copies within the first two months of its release. My second novel 'Between the Headlines' was released in May 2012, by Good Times Books and has been very well received.
My latest book, ‘A Newlywed’s Adventures in Married Land,’ is now available worldwide via Toronto based publishers, Indireads.
My short fiction and poetry have been published in Indian Voices - An anthology, Bricolage Magazine, Synaesthesia Magazine, Writers Asylum, Single Solitary Thought, Damazine, Love Across Borders, Shades of Love and other anthologies and literary magazines in more than four continents.
My monthly column, ‘Trippin With Shweta’ is a steady feature in the Indian magazine, ‘Travel and Flavours’.
The New Indian Express, One Philippines, Venture (Indonesia) and Geo (Indian edition) have published many of my travel columns. My non-fiction pieces have been featured in Chicken Soup for the Indian Spiritual Soul and Chicken Soup for the Indian Soul – On Friendship. I also write and illustrate on the joys and trials of being a parent, in a blog called, ‘The Times Of Amma – The motherhood bulletin with badly-drawn cartoons.’
Before dedicating my life to writing, I worked as a TV news correspondent with CNN-IBN and as a Communications Officer at Greenpeace India.

So, when did you first know that you wanted to be an author? Did you always want to be one?

I’ve always been a writer- right from the age of five, when my mother sent one of my childishly scrawled short stories to a newspaper contest, till today. Some of my most treasured possessions are my dog-eared bundles of notebooks filled with pages and pages of my musings, rantings, stories and in some cases, poems that were written in misguided grandoise moments.
I’ve always wanted to reach out to others with stories and narrations of real life incidents.

What prompted you to write the book "A Newlywed's Adventures in Married Land"?

Lewis Carroll’s’ ‘Alice’ has always fascinated me.
As a child, I’ve lived in Muscat, Kottayam, Calicut, Kochi, Hubli, Pune, Delhi and Bangalore. Two years, sometimes three in one town and then we would move on. Sometimes, it was mid-term as I walked in to friendships formed on the first day of school. I would stand at the fringes – an interloper trying to blend. Masking my nervousness with a grin I would force the extrovert in me out, while the nerd in me would yearn to curl up with my books and my dog for company.
I’d wonder about Alice and how she coped in that Wonderland of hers. I had my wonderful parents as a constant source of support, no matter which new city we moved to. Alice however, had no way of knowing whether this was a dream or if there was another way out of the rabbit hole.
Much later, all grown up and married, my husband and I moved to El Salvador in Central America where I tried to cope with the rigours of bringing up my baby, then barely five months old and the trials of learning to communicate in Spanish. While I thanked my lucky stars for my husband’s support, I remembered that girl I used to be long ago.
The newlywed who moved to a foreign land and learnt her way around it.
Much like a lot of my friends who had left their family and careers and friends behind.
Much like my childhood friend Alice trying to grapple with the eccentricities of Wonderland.
And that’s how this book was born.

As I was going through your bio it seemed like the story was inspired by your own life at some point. Is that true?

I have found that when I write about the things I know and have experienced, the story flows with a life of its own.
My books are slotted in the genre of Urban Fiction, as I have lived through the research needed for all of them. My own life if it were a book would be slotted in Urban Non-Fiction.
So, yes I do get inspired by real life – but it’s not always my own.

What was the biggest challenge while writing the book?

I prefer finishing my manuscript first and then working on the edits. This is the process I have followed with my first two books. However, with this book, my publisher and I were working on edits simultaneously, sometimes from chapter to chapter and this was challenging.
Though, I believe the book is what it is today, thanks to this process.

Did you ever suffer writer's block? If yes, what did you do to get over it?

I approach writing as I’ve approached all my previous jobs. I could not afford to have a day off as a reporter or as a communications executive. When you are at work you work, no matter your mood. This approach works for me as I manage to write at least a little bit, every day. Being my own boss, I stick to this tactic to ensure I don’t slack off or procrastinate.
I also work on multiple projects simultaneously. This way even if I don’t feel the words flowing for a certain story, I know that it will for another column or blog waiting for my attention.

What were your feelings when you first saw the finished copy of your book?

I always think of my books as my babies. ‘A Newlywed’s Adventures in Married Land’, was my first foray into the world of eBooks and seeing the first finished copy of the book was like seeing a newborn make her appearance for the first time.

Are you completely satisfied with your writing or would you like to change something in your story, given a chance?

For me, my writings are little slices of Life. And like life, I don’t think you can change or rewrite your basic narrative once it has happened. So, no, I never change the basic gist of my stories once written. This is not to say that I do not edit, I do. Sometimes, I edit my manuscripts as many as three times. But I never make structural changes or personality changes in my characters.

Well said! Now lets hear a few things about you. To start with, is writing your full time profession?

Yes, I’m a full-time writer. I’m also a travel columnist and a work from home mother to a two-year old.

When you're not writing what do you do to relax?

When I’m not writing, you’ll find me playing with my daughter, reading, trying out new recipes or travelling.

What’s the schedule of a typical day for you?

My day is usually made-up of play and reading with my daughter, getting the day’s meals ready and sticking to my daily word count – albeit by working on a novel, short story, blog or a travel column.

If your book is adopted for a movie, which actors would you like to play the characters of your story?

Such an interesting question!
I’ve never thought about it before. I’d say I’d love for Priyanka Chopra or Vidya Balan to play the role of Mythili and Farhan Akhtar or Siddharth (Rang De Basanti) to play the role of Siddharth.

I guess Vidya Balan and Farhan Akhtar would suit Mythili and Siddharth very well! Um, so what are your favourite books?

I’ve had the good fortune to grow up surrounded by books. My parents started reading to me at an age that I cannot even remember and that is what motivated me to start putting down my thoughts no matter how silly or random they were. There have been so many books that have left such a deep imprint on my mind that it is impossible to list them all.
To name a few, I would have to go with Isaac Asimov’s Robot Dreams, which is also on my read and re-read list. I love all the books in Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next series. They are addictive for someone who loves literature in all its forms. My favourite classic is Charles Dickens, ‘Tale of Two Cities’ and Lucy Maud Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables. I am also a Muggle who is madly in love with the Harry Potter series.

To kill a Mockingbird is one of my favourites too! What are you reading currently?

I am currently reading Elif Shafak’s The Forty Rules of Love.

What is your advice for aspiring writers?

The biggest challenge about being a full-time writer is sticking with it to the end, in the absence of an external editor, boss or deadline. Especially in the beginning, when you have no idea that your manuscript might be picked up for publication at all, it is easy to sit down and put your hands up. And so my advice to new writers is to persevere and be patient even in the face of rejection.

Just for curiosity, if you’re ever deserted in an island alone, which 5 books would you pick to carry along with you? And why?

Tough question!I’d probably carry a childhood favourite Enid Blyton’s The Secret Island, for tips on how to survive. And Douglas Adam’s The Hitchikers’ Guide to The Galaxy for those long nights when I’ll have to look at the stars and wonder if anyone there is looking down at me. I’d pick one book at random from Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next series, for the literature lover in me. I’d take Kiran Desai’s Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard to remind me of daily life in the small towns of our country and the lengths to which, one would go to avoid the responsibilities of adult life.
And finally J.K Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, because it is long and will give me good company for all those long days and nights ahead of me and will reassure me that all life’s riddles will be solved at last and that darkness will not triumph no matter how stark and lonely the road ahead seems.

Such diverse and well described choices! Finally Shweta, thank you so much! I loved the chat with you. Lots of good wishes for the success of your book. :)

Shweta Ganesh Kumar is a writer and travel columnist. An alumnus of the Symbiosis Institute of Mass Communication, she worked as Communications Officer for Greenpeace India and as a correspondent with CNN-IBN, before dedicating her life to writing.

Her third book and first novella, 'A Newlywed's Adventures in Married Land,' is now available worldwide from Toronto-based publishers Indireads.

Her second novel ‘Between the Headlines-The travails of a TV reporter’ was released in May 2012 and is now available in bookstores and online stores.

Her first novel ‘Coming Up On The Show… The Travails of a news trainee’ sold more than 10,000 copies within the first two months of its release in May 2011 and was also listed on multiple bestseller lists.

A mother herself, she writes on the joys and trials of being a parent in a five day a week bulletin called 'The Times Of Amma - the motherhood bulletin with badly-drawn cartoons.'

The New Indian Express, One Philippines and Geo (Indian edition) have published many of her travel columns. RobinAge, a leading children’s newspaper features her pet and travel columns for children. ‘Kiski Kahani – The Ramayana Project’, an Open Space initiative, features her essays on the diversity of the Ramayana.

Her non-fiction pieces have been featured in Chicken Soup for the Indian Spiritual Soul, Chicken Soup for the Indian Soul – On Friendship and also in CBW’s India’s Top 42 Weekend Getaways eBook. Women's Web has featured her feminist columns and Mahindra's Mom and Me - her columns on being a new mother.

Her short fiction has been published in Indian Voices- an anthology, Shades of Love (An Anthology of Short Stories), Winds of Change (An Anthology), Australian Women Online, Single Solitary Thought, Pothiz, Damazine and the Asia Writes Project.

“Dependent!!?”
Mythili and Siddharth realize that being newlywed in a foreign country is very different from being passionately in love, long-distance.
She has just moved to the Philippines to be with the love of her life and new husband, Siddharth. After being a hard-as-nails reporter who covered crime stories of the goriest kind, Mythili is now just a ‘dependent’. On top of that, unemployment, encounters with expat-wives and culture shock leave her feeling like she has fallen down a rabbit hole. Will their love survive, or will she become just another unhappily married expatriate wife?
Will this real life Alice ever embrace her Wonderland?

This was an ARC that I thought would be fun reading. My prediction wasn’t quite correct but the book wasn’t a disappointment either. It was a fast-paced, light read and a mixture of lots of emotions involving little bit of fun as well. One of the prime reasons for my choosing this book was the similarities that the author have drawn with “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”- I was curious about how she had connected the two completely different phenomenon, and while reading the book, I found the metaphor was woven wittily and meaningfully.

After marrying Siddharth, Mythili finds herself landing in Manila, detached from his own world, friends and relatives. Back in India she was a passionate crime reporter but after reaching the foreign country with Siddharth she is tagged as a merely ‘dependent’ person. The ‘Desi Gang’, comprised of NRIs living out there was no help at all. The story is about how Mythili adopts herself there against all odds.

From the very beginning I liked Mythili’s character. One can easily understand her state of mind after leaving her country and being in a whole new world, surrounded by bunch of new and different people who were nothing like her. She could hardly be herself with them. After working passionately all her life, being jobless and the dependent status totally sucked! But the series of events somehow made her discover herself better and her bond with Siddharth strengthen even more. Siddharth was very supportive of her and tried his best to make her feel comfortable. The relationship the two shared was beautiful and really sweet.

To cut things short, Shweta has done a pretty good job with the book. The narration is lucid and captivating. All in all, it was an interesting and enjoyable reading experience for me.

Shweta Ganesh Kumar is a writer and travel columnist. An alumnus of the Symbiosis Institute of Mass Communication, she worked as Communications Officer for Greenpeace India and as a correspondent with CNN-IBN, before dedicating her life to writing.

Her third book and first novella, 'A Newlywed's Adventures in Married Land,' is now available worldwide from Toronto-based publishers Indireads.

Her second novel ‘Between the Headlines-The travails of a TV reporter’ was released in May 2012 and is now available in bookstores and online stores.

Her first novel ‘Coming Up On The Show… The Travails of a news trainee’ sold more than 10,000 copies within the first two months of its release in May 2011 and was also listed on multiple bestseller lists.

A mother herself, she writes on the joys and trials of being a parent in a five day a week bulletin called 'The Times Of Amma - the motherhood bulletin with badly-drawn cartoons.'

The New Indian Express, One Philippines and Geo (Indian edition) have published many of her travel columns. RobinAge, a leading children’s newspaper features her pet and travel columns for children. ‘Kiski Kahani – The Ramayana Project’, an Open Space initiative, features her essays on the diversity of the Ramayana.

Her non-fiction pieces have been featured in Chicken Soup for the Indian Spiritual Soul, Chicken Soup for the Indian Soul – On Friendship and also in CBW’s India’s Top 42 Weekend Getaways eBook. Women's Web has featured her feminist columns and Mahindra's Mom and Me - her columns on being a new mother.

Her short fiction has been published in Indian Voices- an anthology, Shades of Love (An Anthology of Short Stories), Winds of Change (An Anthology), Australian Women Online, Single Solitary Thought, Pothiz, Damazine and the Asia Writes Project.

About

I'm Vinny, a bookaholic, obsessed with books. I like to read books from any genre if the story-line is interesting and realistic. I love collecting books and I wish to have a library of my own someday. Also, I run a book review blog in my spare time.